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She spent her years raising six children, but was almost secretly one of the foremost engineering, inventing and designing minds of the Georgian era.

But she never took any credit for her amazing work and had to register her creations in the name of 'the Guppy family'.

Now the inventor and her little-celebrated achievements have been recognised in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography - more than 150 years after the bridge opened.

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Guppy obtained a patent in 1811 for 'erecting and constructing bridges without arches or sterlings'

Anna Silva, from Oxford University Press said Guppy's early advocacy of a suspension bridge in Clifton pre-dated Brunel's own involvement.

She said: "In March 1811, she obtained a patent for 'erecting and constructing bridges and rail-roads without arches or sterlings, whereby the danger of being washed away by floods is avoided'.

"She was an early advocate of a suspension bridge in Clifton and was reported to have been 'assiduously employed in forming the model of a bridge to be erected across the Avon' in 1811, when she sought subscriptions to erect such a bridge, in which she herself seems to have been an early investor.

"When Telford approached her for permission to use her patented invention, she reportedly waived the fees, an act of generosity and shrewd branding which enabled him to complete the Menai Bridge in 1826 and her to claim credit for its design," she added.

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"She was said to have made models for Brunel of his inventions. Though the precise impact of her ideas on his design is unknown, her early advocacy of a suspension bridge in Clifton certainly pre-dates Brunel's own involvement in such a scheme."

Guppy first patented a way of piling foundations to create a new type of suspension bridge in 1811.

This provided the blueprint for both Brunel's Clifton Suspension Bridge and Thomas Telford's Menai Bridge, it was claimed.

She and her family were close to Brunel - her son Thomas was GWR's principal engineer - and she supposedly gave the plans to Brunel to enter into a competition to design a bridge over the Avon in Bristol.

The modest genius also dreamt up dozens of other inventions, including ways to protect ships from barnacles and a device to boil an egg from the steam of a kettle.

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The engineer and mother-of-six was an early advocate of a suspension bridge in Clifton

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Mrs Guppy believed women shouldn't be 'boastful'

But despite Guppy being famous in Bristol in her own lifetime, it was more for her flamboyant social life than for her incredible mind.

She contributed to many major engineering projects, but in letters advising Brunel on building the GWR railway, for example, she wrote that she didn't want the credit because women must 'not be boastful'.

Guppy and her first husband were at the centre of Bristol's high society, but she found herself widowed at 67.

She then married a man 30 years her junior who quickly frittered away the family fortune.

The only thing recognising Guppy's role in shaping today's Bristol is a blue plaque on her former Clifton home.